Oh, So Glaringly Obvious
by on rooftops
Summary: "Teddy's a bit of a man-whore," James said in a rush. / "More than a bit, actually. He's very much a man-whore." Al considered that for a moment. "Except that no one ever pays him, obviously." — Lily/Teddy


**A/N:** So I was pretty sure that I was done writing Teddy/Lily for a while. And then I was listening to (some pretty god-awful) music and I got inspired to write the oh-so-cliché pub fic. So I apologize. I'm almost embarrassed to post this. Also, I'm procrastinating on some stuff for my internship that's due tomorrow. Who knew that my school-related procrastination would extend to the summer? And I went to a DMB concert last night (lovelovelove) and the music got me thinking even more.

Regardless of its rather over-done topic and smutty content, I hope that you enjoy this, and please review and let me know what you think! (Also, there's nothing too bad in here, but if you think I'm corrupting young minds by labeling it T, let me know).

**Disclaimer:** Harry Potter? Yeah, not mine.  
Lyrics (that I don't own) in order of use:  
Lady Antebellum – "American Honey" The Beatles – "Helter Skelter" Jay-Z – "Young Forever" Katy Perry – "One of the Boys" Regina Spektor – "Dance Anthem of the '80s"  
Cobra Starship – "Good Girls Go Bad" Train – "I Wish You Would" Lily Allen – "Are You Mine?" Dave Matthews Band – "You and Me"

* * *

_there's a wild, wild whisper blowing in the wind_

Al paled when Lily narrowed her green eyes into the patented, terrifying, Lily-Potter-glare, but he didn't give up. "Really. I think it'd be better if you didn't come."

"I'm coming. It's Teddy's twenty-eighth birthday." Or, as he preferred, his tenth anniversary of turning eighteen – the boy just refused to grow up. "Of course I'm going to be there." Usually her brothers gave in to anything when she used that hard tone with them, anxious to avoid her revenge. But Al was being oddly stubborn, so Lily sighed, "Unless there's a good reason for me not to go?"

"It's just that…well, it's in a pub."

Lily nodded, "I know. And I'm legal."

"But you're still young. And it's in a pub," he repeated.

Lily raised one eyebrow at Al, who scowled as she said, "I was in Slytherin, Albus."

"You say that as if it's an explanation for everything. Merlin, it's not as if you lot had weekly orgies!"

Lily's face remained cool, "And how would you know?"

"Lily Luna Potter!" James' scandalized voice came from the doorway, and Al sighed in relief as his older brother stormed into Lily's room. His eyes were wide with shock, but there was a definite twinkle to the hazel color that belied his sharp tone. "Did I just hear you admit that Slytherins, in addition to being arseholes, are also sluts?"

"You did not," Lily snapped. Her glare wasn't quite as effective when she had to split it between both brothers. "James, would you please explain to Al that it's perfectly all right for me to go to Teddy's party?"

James glanced at Al, "I thought you were going to talk to her about that weeks ago."

"Yeah, well, turns out I'm a bit of a coward."

Lily stared from one brother to the other, "What, do you guys meet weekly to figure out how to keep me from doing anything fun?"

"Look, Lil, it's not like we don't trust you, or anything." Al began.

That was something of a revelation; Lily had assumed that both boys had stopped trusting her the minute she was sorted into Slytherin. "Well, what is it, then?"

They exchanged panicked looks, and then James sighed, "We might as well tell the truth. It's not as if it's really all that awful anyway."

Al shrugged, "But Teddy'll kill us if he hears about it."

They turned back to Lily, who looked as if she might be contemplating how best to murder them, and Al said, "Promise not to tell Teddy what we're saying, all right?"

"Did he want you to uninvite me, or something?" Lily felt a chill creep into her veins. Over the last few months her and Teddy's friendship had become somewhat strained, but she hadn't thought it had gotten so bad that he didn't want her at his party.

"No! No, this is just us being your brothers, looking out for you and all that." James promised.

Lily's blood returned to its usual temperature as she muttered, "Overprotective bastards is what you mean." At a look from Al she nodded, "Yeah, yeah I promise I won't tell Teddy about this, whatever it is."

"Okay," James flicked his wand at the door and it swung shut, and Al muttered a silencing charm.

Lily shook her head, "You're acting as if you're about to confess a murder or something. What's going on?"

James laughed, "It's really not so terrible as all that. We just don't want Mum to hear, because she'll likely pose an intervention or something."

"Fine. Let me hear it, then."

"It's not that we don't trust you," James picked up where he had left off, "It's that we don't trust Teddy."

Lily blinked in surprise. That was not what she had been expecting at all.

"See, we know you look up to him, Lil. He's like an older brother-slash-best friend to you and that's good." Al said, "But he's…"

"Well, he's kind of…" James attempted.

Lily tried to keep her voice light, "Merlin would one of you just spit it out?"

"He's a bit of a man-whore," James said in a rush.

"More than a bit, actually. He's very much a man-whore." Al considered that for a moment, "Except that no one ever pays him, obviously."

Lily stared at them for two silent seconds before she burst out laughing, "Like I didn't know that already. You know he's in all the papers when the writers have nothing better to report on, right? With a different witch draped over him in every photo. I figured it out ages ago." And at first it had bothered her, although probably not for the reasons James and Albus expected it to. They thought that Teddy's lack of discretion would shatter the idealized version of him that she held in her mind. But really his actions had just hurt her. She knew it was irrational, because she was ages too young for him and because he loved her like a little sister, if that, but she wanted Teddy. She wanted him in every way, and it hurt her that he was just throwing himself away on girls who only wanted him for the night. She had even confronted him about it, in her way. When she'd asked why he hadn't had a steady girlfriend since Victoire, she had expected him to protest or glare or say something along the lines of "You're too young to understand." Instead he had looked at her for a long moment, sighed, and said, "I'm still looking." And Lily had let it go at that, although she had been longing to suggest that he open his eyes and look right in front of him, or at the very least start looking with his heart rather than his penis. But she hadn't.

Her brothers were staring at her, "We thought you'd be pissed."

"Teddy's a grown man, he can do whatever he wants." Lily smiled, "So, since I know already and won't be horrified when I see him leave with some witch, I can go, right?" Not that she had been planning on skipping it. But it was always best to humor her brothers.

They looked at each other and nodded, "Yeah. Just," Al put one hand on Lily's chin and forced her hard eyes to meet his, "Please be careful, all right?"

She grinned at him, "I always am."

James snorted and canceled the silencing charm. Just as they were about to leave Lily asked, "Can you guys promise me something?"

They turned to look at her, both fidgeting nervously. Promising Lily things had caused horrible damage in the past, "Depends."

Lily rolled her eyes, "I just want you guys to have fun tonight. Don't spend the whole party worrying about me, because I am perfectly able to look out for myself."

They were silent for a moment, and then Al nodded, "Yeah. Yeah I promise."

Lily turned her eyes to James, who sighed. "You're my little sister. Nothing's going to change that, and so I have to worry about you. But I promise I'll try."

She smiled gratefully at them and they left, taking her composure with them. She twirled in an excited circle and tried to shove down the nervousness that was twining through her stomach. Slytherins didn't _get_ nervous, she told herself fiercely.

But she had reason, she supposed, to be nervous. She had decided ages ago that if she turned seventeen and still felt those butterflies when she saw Teddy, if she still wanted to impress him, if she was still holding out because her first time _had_ to be with him, then she'd need to find a way to at least tell him. And his birthday party seemed as good a time as any. Better, maybe, because he'd definitely be wasted and she could probably get a buzz going without getting too sloppy. And it'd be easier that way.

That night was the night that everything was either going to come together or blow up into jagged, heartbroken pieces. She definitely had a right to be nervous. "But," she spoke aloud as she faced herself in the mirror and examined her red curls, "You don't need to give in to that right. It will be fine, and you will not be nervous." Because when Lily got nervous she tended to fuck things up. And that just wasn't acceptable, not that night.

_look out, 'cause here she comes_

Rose banged into Lily's room without knocking, "Thank Merlin you're coming tonight," she collapsed on her cousin's bed, "Scor got called away on business and I was not thrilled about spending the night consoling Al and James about their inability to get laid."

She rolled over to face her cousin, who leaned against her cluttered desk, "Merlin, Lil." Rose swung her legs over the side of the bed and stared. Lily's hair hung straight past her shoulders, and she wore a sparkly green halter top and skinny jeans that clung to her legs until they hit the top of her high-high-high-heeled silver sandals. Her face was mostly free of makeup, although her lips shone with a bit of clear gloss. "You look gorgeous."

"Don't I always?" Lily grinned, and Rose raised one eyebrow.

"Not like this." Rose paused, "Are you trying to prove something to someone?"

Lily shrugged, "I figured tonight would be as good a night as any to remind everyone that I'm not a baby anymore."

Rose stared for a moment longer. Out of all of her cousins, only Rose could occasionally see through Lily's cool exterior, and she could see the bright excitement sparking at Lily's usually calm eyes.

"Are you sure that's all?"

Lily smiled slowly, "What else is there?"

Something, or rather someone, that Lily had wanted for a while. Rose had seen the way that Lily's eyes tracked Teddy whenever he was around, had noticed how the girl grew quiet whenever they mentioned the metamorphmagus, had realized that the two had grown oddly awkward around each other during the last several months. But Lily's privacy meant more to her than anything else, and Rose wasn't anxious to start the night off with accusations. And if anyone in the family should support Lily's apparent and rather unorthodox love for Teddy, it was definitely the girl whose love had forced a reproduction of _Romeo and Juliet_ back in fifth year.

"Well, no one would even dream of calling you a baby looking like that." Rose stood, smoothing her hands over her skirt and wishing that she had dressed a little more outrageously.

"This is what I'm saying," despite her verbal dismissal, Lily practically glowed at the praise. It wasn't often that the girl's emotions hovered so near the surface, and Rose felt suddenly worried.

"Be careful, all right?"

Lily rolled her eyes, "And yet you all still treat me like a baby."

Rose shrugged, "It's just because you're my favorite and I don't want you to get hurt."

Lily's voice was cold, "I don't get hurt easily."

"I know, I know. I'm done lecturing for the night. You want me to apparate us there? I've been before."

"Yes, please," Lily stuck her wand into her pocket and took Rose's hand.

"Yeah," Rose shut her eyes and turned, and they stood in the crowded pub's coat-room. Rose turned to face Lily, "Ready?"

Lily inhaled, holding her breath for a moment before releasing it, "Ready."

_forever young, I wanna be forever young_

It wasn't a Cinderella moment when Rose and Lily entered the main area of the pub and pushed their way through the swaying crowd, finally reaching the bar like two swimmers coming up for air. Everyone didn't turn to stare at the reborn Lily Potter, people didn't lean closer to their neighbors and demand to know who that girl was.

But Lily could feel eyes on her – not everyone's, but some. She smiled at the bartender, who grinned easily back and slid her a shot glass of amber liquid without asking what she wanted. "On the house," he called over the pounding of the music, and Lily raised it to him before tossing it back. "Cheers."

Rose watched her closely as she asked for a beer and took a slow sip. She had promised not to baby the girl, but every bone in her body was pushing her toward ordering Lily back home. Then James and Al were there and Rose smiled gratefully at them because if anyone could manage Lily it was them.

"Hey ladies," Al leaned against the bar and smiled at them, although his eyes lingered over Lily's hand, now curved easily around a sweating glass.

James looked about to say something, but Al shot him a threatening look, so instead he patted Lily's smooth hair and said, "You look nice, Lil."

She smiled at him, "Thanks, Jamie."

Rose raised an eyebrow at Al, whose eyes promised that he'd explain later, as he asked, "Have you guys seen Teddy yet?"

"No," Lily shook her head, "Although my guess is that he's somewhere in there." She waved a hand toward the packed dance floor.

"Probably." James signaled to the bartender and picked up his drink, "He'll be over here soon, though."

The four amused themselves by gossiping about the many witches and wizards on the dance floor until James finally gave in and disappeared into the crowd to find someone he wasn't related to to dance with, and Al followed a few seconds later. "I hate Scor for abandoning me," Rose muttered.

"Hey," Lily exclaimed, "_I'm_ here."

"Yes, but you will probably disappear the minute anyone mildly attractive comes up to you and I'll be _all alone_," Rose whined, a smile curving her lips.

Before Lily could respond familiar hands closed around her eyes, blocking Rose from her sight, and she felt a hot breath whispering past her ear, "Guess who."

Lily pursed her lips thoughtfully, "Nott? No, Scamander?"

And then he whirled her around and looked down into her face, "Funny, kid. You're hilarious."

Lily was surprised to see that he wasn't drunk yet; his hair wasn't haphazardly swirling through the colors of the rainbow, and his focused brown eyes scanned her body quickly before returning to her face.

"I know, I know. Happy birthday, Lupin." Lily pulled him into a hug and he hugged her back tentatively before pulling away and turning to Rose.

"Hey Rosie."

"Teddy," Rose tried to see if Lily was offended by Teddy's quick dismissal. If she was, she was hiding it well. Rose smiled up at him, "Happy birthday."

"I've told you, it's my tenth anniversary of turning eighteen."

Lily sighed, "Fine, happy anniversary, then."

"Thank you." Teddy still wouldn't look at her. Lily wondered absently what had made him approach her in the first place, if he wasn't interested in talking.

"Want a drink?" Lily asked, waving a hand toward the bartender, who hurried over at the gesture.

"Sure," Teddy ordered and Lily smiled innocently in response to Rose's suspicious look. Sometimes it bothered her that the girl was so bloody intuitive.

"Thanks for coming," Teddy waved his empty hand at them, "I've got to go make the rounds." He headed off toward the entrance, where a group of his friends from the Ministry had gathered, and Rose turned back to face Lily.

"That was weird," she tipped the last of her drink into her mouth.

"What do you mean?"

"I've never seen Teddy act that distant around you."

Lily raised an eyebrow, "He's been like that for ages. Have you really not noticed?" She was curious if she had been imagining, or at least exaggerating, their odd interactions over the last several months.

"Well yeah, but usually he'll at least look at you," Rose conceded.

She shrugged in response and glanced around. Two of Teddy's friends were heading straight toward where they were sitting and Lily said, "It's not cheating if you're just dancing with another guy."

Rose stared at her in confusion, but then the two reached them and grinned, saying together, "Care to dance?"

Lily shot Rose a look before smiling at the dark haired man in front of her, "I'd love to."

"I'm Rob Cleveland," he said as he led her by the hand toward the crowded dance floor.

"Lil," Lily replied, allowing him to pull her close to him.

They didn't talk much after that, they were too busy letting the music burn the beats through them.

_and I swear maybe one day, you're gonna wanna make out with me_

Teddy gulped down his drink and dropped the glass on a table as he passed it. He didn't glance back over his shoulder, he tried not to think about how Lily had looked, how bloody gorgeous she was. She always was, of course, but usually he could at least handle looking at her. Tonight, tonight if he looked at her he would grab her and kiss her and then Al and James and probably Rose would murder him.

He grabbed Jazz, one of the women from his department, and pulled her toward him, and she smiled happily up at him as they began dancing. He forced his eyes to focus on her, forced himself not to look at Lily, or look for Lily, or even _consider_ moving anywhere near where Lily was – which was not by the bar, he realized when he went back for a few more drinks.

His eyes searched the crowd and he caught sight of her red hair. She was dancing – if you could even call it that – with Rob from the office. Irrational, stupid jealousy boiled up in his veins as he watched them move together. He wanted to be the one holding her, he wanted to be the one smiling down at her. But that was not acceptable, he reminded himself. She was Lily fucking Potter. Her name ran like a mantra through his mind as he tossed back another shot before his friend Carrie grabbed his hand and pulled him back to the dance floor.

Lily Potter, she was Lily fucking Potter and she was very much off limits.

_you are so sweet, so sweet, dancing and moving to that beat, that beat_

Lily couldn't keep her eyes off him. She leaned against the bar, alone, and watched as his multicolored hair tipped back, his brown eyes closed, his body pressed against a girl who she refused to recognize. The buttons on his shirt had come undone at some point during the night, and she could just make out the faint smattering of brown hair in the dim light. She longed to run her hands over him, to tug his shirt off and press her hands into the skin of his back and wrap her legs around his waist and – "What ya doing?" Al interrupted her inappropriate musings and leaned drunkenly against the bar beside her.

She turned to smile at him, "I'm going to dance with Teddy."

"All right." Al laughed, "Just don't let him take – take advantage of you."

Lily waved a hand at him in dismissal and joined the crowd. She weaved her way toward Teddy and the girl, wondering how she was going to interrupt their dance without being rude and realizing when she reached them that she was just going to _have_ to be a bitch.

"Teddy," she stood on tiptoe and hissed in his ear, "Can you ditch her and dance with me? I haven't seen you all night."

The girl glared at her, "Who the fuck're you? Go away."

But Teddy had already let go of her, "Bye bye Melanie." He smiled guilelessly at her as he placed long-fingered hands on Lily's waist, his thumbs gliding under the fabric of her shirt and over her sharp hipbones. Lily slid her hands over his shoulders and allowed him to pull her close to him.

"I thought you'd never ask," Teddy murmured against her hair. "Although if I weren't so drunk I'd never ever ever touch you."

Lily smiled, her lips moved against his skin as she spoke, "Well, I'm glad you're drunk, then."

He pressed a light kiss to her hair, "Me too."

_just one night couldn't be so wrong_

It had been late when she finally had figured that Teddy was drunk enough to forget whatever had come between them in the last several months, and that she was tipsy enough to make the first move. The second song that they danced to – some depraved Muggle dance hit – was the last one of the evening, and Lily held her breath as Teddy pulled away slightly to look down at her. Here was the moment, here was the test.

He kept his arm around her waist and he asked, "Did you bring a coat?"

She smiled up at him, hope surfacing in her fierce green eyes, "No."

"Apparate us home?" He pulled her closer and she shut her eyes, turning and finding herself standing exactly where she had hoped to end up – Teddy's red and gold decorated bedroom.

"Merlin, you're incredible," Teddy breathed as he lowered his lips to hers and very, very gently kissed her.

It was gentle for a second, and then he ran his tongue along her lower lip and gentleness was the last thing on either of their minds.

Her hands were exploring his chest and his fingers were expertly unclipping her bra and his mouth moved from hers to her neck, his tongue and teeth playing against her pulse point.

And then her fingers were undoing his jeans and he pulled away and met her fiery eyes with his and she wondered for a moment whether he was really as drunk as she had thought when he asked, "Are you sure?"

But he must have been wasted because even a tipsy Teddy would never have let her unzip his jeans, even a tipsy Teddy never would have unzipped hers.

And a tipsy Teddy would certainly not have picked her up and carried her to his bed.

_and all I do is promise to change my ways_

Al pounded on the door to James's flat early the next morning, and when his brother didn't immediately answer he tugged his wand from the waistband of his jeans and tapped it angrily against the lock. The door swung open and Al strode through, shouting his brother's name as he shut it behind him and headed into the living room, which was tragically empty.

"Merlin, Al, what's wrong?" James stumbled into the hallway dressed in only his boxers and squinting in the late morning light.

"Why the hell weren't you answering your Floo calls?"

"Because I'm kind of hungover, and your shouting is certainly not helping." James stumbled into the kitchen and opened one of the cupboards, revealing a healthy stock of potions, most supplied by Lily. He found the hangover potion and swallowed it before turning to face Al, looking much more alert. "Now, what's happened?"

"Lily didn't come home last night. I told Mum and Dad she crashed here – did she?" Al looked hopeful for about a second, but James's face darkened and Al realized that they were royally fucked.

"Shit." James shook his head, "We told her she shouldn't go!"

"We need to find her. Maybe she went home with Rose? Last time I saw her she looked pretty wasted; she might have needed Lily's help to get home."

"Yeah, yeah, that's probably right." James crossed his kitchen to the fireplace and tossed some Floo powder into the low flames, stepping into them and whirling away with Al on his heels.

Rose sat in her kitchen, nursing a coffee mug and looking as if she could use some hangover potion herself. Al had grabbed an extra one on the way out of his house, in case James' stock was down, and he placed it on the table in front of his cousin as James started pacing.

"Is Lily here?" He asked as Rose gratefully tipped the acid green potion into her mouth.

She gulped and shook her head, "No, why?" Rose looked from one to the other, "Shit, she didn't come home last night?"

"No," Al started pacing too, following James' path through the small kitchen.

"Shit," Rose repeated. She paused, then asked, "Did you check with Teddy already?"

Al shook his head, "Of course not. He definitely took a girl home with him last night; Lily wouldn't go over there." Although he did have a vague memory of her saying she was going to dance with Teddy, but that didn't mean that…

James stuttered, "Wait, you don't think Lily would go home with him…to…you know…do you?"

Rose wanted to say no, she wanted to tell James that was ridiculous, that Lily was still his little sister and the baby of the family and was definitely not old enough to have sex. But she didn't say any of those things, even though Al and James stared at her, silently begging. "She's almost eighteen," Rose said, by way of explanation.

"She's not!" Al's pale face was flushed with anger, "She's barely seventeen."

"What, and you weren't sleeping around at seventeen?"

"But that's different," James argued. "She's Lily. And it's _Teddy_."  
"Exactly," Rose wondered why she was the only one who had seen what Lily had been thinking for years. "She's Lily, and he's Teddy."

Al shook his head slowly, "She wouldn't."

"_He_ wouldn't," James said. "He'd be too afraid of us murdering him. And Dad…Merlin, can you imagine what he'd do?"

"He was drunk, though," Al pointed out.

"Merlin," James muttered.

"We're jumping to conclusions," Al said. "I'm going over there."

"No, you're not," Rose said, "I am."

"I'm coming with you," James proclaimed.

"No." Rose shook her head, "Can you imagine how mortifying it would be for Lily? No, I'm going alone."

"She deserves to be mortified," James argued, "And I want to kill that bastard."

Rose glared, "Lily does not deserve anything, and I'll let you kill him _after_ we find out what happened, not before."

"Fine," Al grabbed some Floo powder and shoved it messily into Rose's hand, "Go now, please."

Rose looked at him, pity in her eyes as she dropped the Floo powder back into the can and said, "I just want to get dressed first, all right? Why don't you and James go play chess or something? I'll come back as soon as I talk to her."

James nodded and he and Al went into the living room while Rose hurriedly dressed and stepped into the fire, already thinking of curses to use on Teddy if her cousin was any less than whole.

_are you mine, are you mine?_

When she woke up he was still wrapped around her, holding her close; she opened her eyes slowly and held her breath, listening to Teddy's deep sleep breathing. Lily longed to roll over and press her lips to his to wake him up, longed to repeat the night before, longed to steal a time turner and just go back six hours, so she wouldn't have to see him look guilty, wouldn't have to hear him tell her it was a mistake.

Because she knew how Teddy would react, she knew that she was going to have some explaining to do, and she knew that he was probably going to see her as just another girl, probably hate himself a little bit for letting _it_ happen, probably tell her he didn't want anything serious. He wouldn't do it to hurt her, she knew. But he wouldn't lie to her, either. Wouldn't pretend he'd ever felt anything more than drunken lust.

She wanted to stay like this, in his arms, forever. She didn't want to face the mess she'd made with her stupid Slytherin planning. Somewhere in the last month she'd told herself that having sex with Teddy would be worth all the pain that the aftermath would cause. Somewhere in the last month she'd deluded herself.

And now she realized that she might explode with the pain of it all if she could never have him again. Which sounded like a bloody melodramatic Gryffindor thing to say, but who cared, because this type of pain was the burning kind, the kind that didn't let go until you were numb with it.

She closed her eyes and tried to still her heart and her breathing and return to the foggy world where she could forget that he wasn't hers, that he had only been hers for the night. But then there was a sound from the living room and Teddy tensed beside her and the door banged open and Rose stood there, looking downright livid.

"Get dressed," she hissed, before whirling out of the room and shutting the door behind her.

Teddy very slowly let go of Lily and she sat up, turning to face him and seeing the expected guilt in his eyes, mixed with fear and something like regret. "Don't," she ordered.

"Lily," he began, but she shook her head.

"Don't say anything." He looked like he was about to talk, so she added, "Please."

He shut his eyes and fell back against the pillows, and she wanted to kiss away the tortured look on his face, wanted to crawl on top of him and make the whole world disappear, wanted to obliviate Rose and send her away. She wanted a lot of impossibilities.

Instead she rolled out of bed and slid awkwardly back into her clothes from the night before. Teddy's eyes were still shut when she turned around, "I think Rose wanted to see you too."

"You go ahead." Teddy muttered into his arm, "I'll be out in a minute."

Lily rolled her eyes. He was being bloody modest _now_? She moved to the door, and she spoke to its blank surface before she opened it, "Don't try and take the blame for this."

She stepped out into the living room and snapped the door shut, cutting off his guilt ridden, "But it is my fault."

Rose stood by the fire, "I just Flooed your brothers to let them know that you're all right."

"Merlin," Lily stared at her cousin, "You told them?"

"They already knew."

Rose was pissed. Lily didn't think that she'd ever seen the curly-haired girl as angry as she was right then, not even when the whole family drama with Scorpius started. "Are they as angry as you?"

"Angrier."

"Fuck."

"Yes, I imagine quite a bit of that."

"Rose," Lily glared at her, "Don't get pissed at Teddy. This was all me."

Rose shook her head, "No. This was definitely partially you, which is probably something your brothers won't believe, but it was in no way all you."

"I planned it, though."

Her cousin sighed, "I know. I knew. I shouldn't have let you go."

"You knew?" Lily stared at her, "How?"

"I can read you, Lily. Although I didn't know you'd actually sleep with him." Rose bit her lip, "I thought you were just going to wait until he was drunk and get him to actually talk to you."

"That might have been a better plan," Lily murmured, lowering her eyes to her treacherous trembling hands. She swallowed at the sound of Teddy's door swinging open behind her, and the noise of his familiar footsteps across the hardwood as he moved to stand in front of Rose, about five feet away from Lily. Which was about as far as he could get from her while staying in the living room. She closed her eyes for a moment, and when she opened them her face was a calm mask.

Rose turned to face Teddy, whose messy, melancholy-blue hair fell across his guilt-twisted features. "What were you thinking?"

Lily bit the inside of her lip, but the physical pain didn't distract from the emotions whirling through her veins, from the pain that Teddy's expression caused.

"I wasn't." He swallowed and met Rose's angry gaze, "I wasn't thinking, Rose. You know me, you know I wouldn't hurt her."

Why the hell was everyone always talking about her like she wasn't in the room? Especially about this, especially since she had _caused_ this?

Rose stared at him, "Seriously? That's your explanation? You weren't thinking?" Her fingers were twirling her wand, "Al and James wanted to come with me, Teddy. I convinced them not to, but I'm kind of wishing they were here. You'd be dead by now, but then I wouldn't need to listen to your idiotic excuses."

Teddy visibly paled, "Al and James know?"

"Harry doesn't yet," Rose answered his unspoken question, "But I wouldn't depend on it staying quiet for long."

Lily was glaring from Rose to Teddy and back again, but neither was paying any attention to her. "Hey," she muttered, her voice surprisingly weak. She swallowed and tried again, "Hey."

They both turned to look at her, Teddy's eyes looking somewhere over her right shoulder, unable to meet her eyes. "Stop acting like Teddy's done something wrong," she told Rose. "We both made a decision, and of the two of us I was considerably more sober. And we're both adults."

"You're not an adult." Rose snapped and Teddy shook his head, "It _was_ wrong."

"Merlin." In all of her planning, all of her dread of the morning after, Lily had never thought that anyone other than she and Teddy and Teddy's stubbornness would be involved. "Why?" Lily asked him, her voice hard. "Why was it so wrong?"

He still wouldn't meet her eyes, "Because you're eleven years younger than me. And…" he swallowed, "That was your first time, and it should have been special, and because you're you."

Lily raised an eyebrow, "How do you know it was my first time?"

"Oh, stop pretending." Rose snarled, "We all know it was. You're the poster virgin for Slytherin House. Or you were."

Lily blinked at Rose's tone, "Why are you so upset?"

"Because you're not!" Rose stamped her foot against the ground, "Because you're not and you should be. You should be mad at yourself and at Teddy and at me, but you're calm! Why won't you ever show real emotion, Lily? Why aren't you shouting at Teddy for being a stupid boy and at me for barging in on you and at yourself for planning all this?"  
Teddy's eyes met hers for one electric second before he jerked them away, "What does she mean, planning all this?"

Rose closed her eyes, "Oh, Merlin."

Lily's eyes were getting tired from glaring so much, "What's the point in showing emotion when all it does is make you say things you shouldn't be saying?" She directed the question at Rose, who raised shaking hands to cover her face.

"Lily," Teddy's voice wavered on her name, "Tell me what she means."

"I decided a long time ago that I wanted you to be my first." Lily kept her voice steady with difficulty, but she could feel a blush fusing her cheeks, "I told you not to blame yourself."

"You…" Teddy looked ready to explode, "What, you waited until I was drunk enough and then…you were _using_ me? Using me for sex?"

Was it worse if he believed that? If he thought that all she wanted out of him was all she had expected to get? Lily opened her mouth, about to tell him yes, yes she had done to him what he'd done to countless other girls, but Rose spoke before she could, "Lily. Don't do this. Don't lie."

She shook her head, her face positively burning, "I wasn't using you for sex. I was using your…drunkenness in order to have sex in order to get close to you."

"What are you talking about?" He didn't look any less angry.

Rose glanced between the two of them, barely able to breathe with the thought of how awkward it would be to be there for this talk. "I'm gonna go try and calm the boys down." She disapparated rather than taking the time to use the Floo.

Lily stepped closer to Teddy, but he moved back. She lowered her eyes and spoke to her bare feet, "I'm saying that I just wanted to be close to you. I just wanted to be able to talk to you and hold you and I really wanted to have you because you're bloody gorgeous and you're you and…" she was babbling, but she couldn't seem to stop, "I just wanted to be with you."

He didn't say a thing. He turned and walked into his kitchen, and she heard him clinking bottles around but she stayed standing where she was, hating herself and wishing that she had taken the opportunity to kiss him awake this morning and wishing that she could really tell him, really make him see that she loved him.

He returned with two familiar glass bottles, "Hangover potion. You need one?"

She shook her head, "I didn't drink much last night."

He gulped his down and dropped the other one to the couch, "You really planned it?"

Lily nodded, raising her eyes to his. He was finally looking at her, an unfamiliar expression on his face. "I did."

"Because you wanted to be with me?"

She shrugged. Was it hope that lit his brown eyes? "Because…yeah, because I wanted to be with you."

"Things have been weird between us lately." That seemed a bit of a digression, but Lily nodded. "Did you think this was going to make it any better?"

"I thought that the morning-after talk might. Although, I didn't anticipate Rose finding out."

Teddy sighed, "Did it ever occur to you to have the morning-after-talk pre-sex?"

"I didn't want…I didn't want to lose the opportunity."

He blinked, "I thought that you thought that I was a man-whore, that I'd sleep with anything."

"Not me. You'd never have slept with me if you had been sober, or even less drunk. I'm Harry Potter's daughter, for Christ's sake, no one in their right mind would dare have sex with me. But especially you, because I'm like your annoying little…" sister would sound very wrong, considering the events of the night before, "tagalong friend."

"You're not," he said, shaking his head, "You're not annoying. And you're my best friend, Lily, please believe that."

"Even now?" Lily looked at him, "Even after the last few months and last night?"

"You pulled away from me," he said, "You stopped coming to see me and you stopped asking me for help and I," he inhaled, "I pulled away from you too."

"I couldn't handle it anymore," Lily explained.

"Handle what?"

"Why'd you pull away from me?" She countered. "Why'd you barely talk to me at your party last night?"

"Because you're bloody gorgeous and I've…I've wanted you for ages. And I couldn't bear being around you anymore."

Lily stared at him. "That's what I meant, too." Except she wanted more than his body, although she'd settle for it. She'd settle for anything he chose to give her, even if it hurt, even if it was stupid and emotional and self-destructive.

Teddy came close then, tilting her chin so he could meet her eyes, "There's more though, isn't there?"  
"I didn't want – " Lily closed her eyes. She needed to be in control in this moment, "I didn't really want to be just another girl. I wanted – well, I wanted everything." She looked up at him and saw fear in Teddy's gaze, "Which isn't fair, I know. I know it's not, especially because I sort of took advantage of you and never asked for anything before we did it and I'm hap – well, I don't regret last night."

"I don't regret it either," Teddy's breath ghosted across her cheek, "Except…"

Lily pressed a finger to his lips, "Please, no excepts. Can we just leave it and I'll go try to explain myself to the boys and we can…somehow, go back to the way we were?"

Teddy kissed the tip of her finger and pulled back slightly, "This is an important except. You need to know…that if I could have planned how I wanted our first time to go, last night would not have been it. I wouldn't have wanted you to be thinking that being with me was an opportunity that you _could_ miss, I wouldn't have wanted you to think it was just a one-off. I wish that I had told you that I love you, and I wish that you had known that I wasn't just interested in you because I was drunk and you're beautiful." Lily had stopped breathing somewhere in the middle of all those lovely confessions, and she inhaled as he smiled down at her and added, "I'm interested in you because you are _everything_. And I want to have everything with you." He leaned down and pressed his lips against hers and maybe the night before had been passionate and lovely in its own way but this meant so much more.

They broke apart and Lily sighed, "I should probably go talk to Al and James."

"I'm coming," Teddy smiled down at her, "And then we'll go talk to Harry."

"That'll be fun," Lily muttered and Teddy laughed, wrapping one arm around her waist.

"At least if he kills us, we'll be together," he said as they closed their eyes and apparated, holding one another and wishing for nothing more.

_eyes closed, we're gonna spin through the stars…  
__...you and me together, we could do anything, baby  
__you and me together yes, yes_

_

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**A/N: **1. I wish that hangover potions really existed (although I wish that pretty much everything in Harry Potter really existed, so that's not surprising.)

2. Reviews? Yes, please!


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